when you tell me to beware / are you here? / are you there?
I've had an odd day... and for me to say that is an oddity in itself.
It started this afternoon when I read this post about the restraint and seclusion of special needs kids in classrooms. Please take time to read this post - it is heart-breaking and unfortunately TRUE.
From there I jumped over to one of my other "pet" research projects - the Judge Rotenberg Center, which is a school for persons with disabilities that achieves targeted behavior through the use of an electric shock device. Yes, you read that correctly. The kind of device people use to train their pets... except it's used on defenseless disabled kids. The kind of electric shock delivered to children at the JRC is more than 80 times stronger than a conventional stun gun that would be used by a police force.
This "school" is so reviled that the United Nations is interested in its methods - because they believe it violates UN statutes on torture. If your school is under UN suspicion for torture, why the hell are you still open?
The JRC website that I quoted above features a lot of videos and pictures from parents and former students talking about how the GED (shock) device has changed their lives. How much were these people paid? How can so many people be absolutely blind to the degradation and abuse that occurs at JRC?
JRC also uses "mechanical restraint" - which means that students are tied to chairs or "restraint boards" and left that way, often for hours or days. JRC also has a food withholding program.
Once again, I'll just say - WHY THE HELL ARE THEY STILL OPEN?!
Here is a report on a young woman who DIED at JRC. She was 19 years old, mentally handicapped, and non-verbal. A few days before she died, she began acting sick. Because of the "system" used at JRC, staff members thought she was exhibiting "noncompliant" behaviors, so she was punished with the use of "aversives," including being pinched or smacked, having to smell ammonia, or eating jalapeno peppers. On the day that she died, more than 60 "adversives" were administered to this young woman. She was clearly ill, but calling a nurse was delayed because it was thought she was still being "noncompliant" ... and when a nurse was called in, they delayed calling an ambulance. Once at the hospital surgery was delayed, and she died.
This young woman's postmortem report showed that she had a perforated stomach and numerous gastric ulcers. Further investigation revealed that she had been on a food-reduction program that was based on correct answers to "school" work on a computer - but this young woman had no realization of the concept that correct answers = food. If she got her answers wrong, she didn't eat.
Reading this report just made me sick.
And then, after viewing a few videos on the JRC controversy, I stumbled upon another controversy - that of Amanda Baggs. I had unknowingly posted about her before. She is the "author" of a YouTube video called "In My Language." A few years ago I had to watch this video for my Disability and Society video, and at that time I thought it was amazing.
It is - but not for the reason I thought. It's amazing because Amanda Baggs is a fake.
Here is evidence proving that Amanda Baggs has never had low-functioning autism, which is what she claims in the YouTube video. She was a gifted student throughout school. She went to college at Simon's Rock at age 14. It was at Simon's Rock that she began use of LSD and other psychotropic hallucinogens. She was diagnosed with schizophrenia, diagnosed herself with DID or DPD (also known as Multiple Personality Disorder), then took that all back, and now claims that she is a low-functioning non-verbal autistic. She has also been diagnosed with Factitious Disorder / Munchausen Syndrome, which if you ask me explains a lot. Please read the first link posted in this paragraph - it explains more than I can get into here.
Autism of the sort that she is claiming to have does NOT just appear around age 14. You don't live a life as a speaking, toilet-trained, gifted child for 14 years and then just suddenly REGRESS unless there is sufficient trauma, like a closed head injury or a stroke. There's just no way. That's just not autism.
And please don't think I have no idea about these things - I have been working with children with disabilities since I was in the seventh grade (I am now 23 and a senior in college). I have worked with children who are affected with autism. Their parents would kill for them to be able to speak/write/type with the clarity that Amanda Baggs claims to possess. They would also kill for their kids to be able to be toilet-trained, or to look them in the eye, or to stop biting themselves.
I have always held persons with Munchausen syndrome / Munchausen by proxy disorder to be cruel and disgusting people. Parents or caregivers with MBP have injected their charges with feces, contaminated waste, or worse. And people who fake an illness to get attention - I'd like to introduce you to families whose lives are hell because their children have a legitimate illness or disability and they can't get the support, respite, medical supplies, insurance, or medical care that they need.
What makes it worse in Amanda Baggs' case is that she has become a sort of "godsend" to families who have children with autism. She appears to be competent with her typing device, and to be fully cognizant, and to laud herself as some sort of "autism activist," and that has led to false hope. I am not one to squash hope for these families, because I know well enough how damn little they have - but this sort of thing just isn't true.
She is being held up as a savior to this community of people who are desperate for answers about autism. I think it is sick that she holds herself up in this way when there is plenty of proof that she IS "normal." She does need understanding and help, but not from the world at large - from psychiatric professionals, more like.
I would like Amanda to have to look my kids and their families in the eye. I have worked with and lived with these kids, day in and day out. I have celebrated their successes and mourned at their troubles. I have danced with a girl who wears protective clothing to keep herself from bashing her face into her knee or from biting herself, among others. I have made it my mission to speak for the voiceless - not fakers.
It pisses me off that people can claim we're so "advanced" when our attitude towards people with disabilities includes faking things to get attention, and electric shocks. As many people quoted about the JRC have said, if these techniques were being used on prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, the whole world would be in an uproar. But because we're using them on kids with disabilities, kids can DIE and nobody notices.
Want to do something useful for the autism community? Or the disability community as a whole?
Look into these kids' eyes. Realize they're people too - realize that all people with disabilities deserve rights, safety, and love. They deserve better than what we've given them so far. Work for their love, success, and welfare. Give THEM a voice.
Here are some of my kids -
Lydia
Melissa
Madi
Grace
Shawna
Wendy
I love these kids more than life itself - it bothers me to think that the world is so damn backwards that they're continually going to be screwed over. I just wish everybody could see them the way I see them, love them the way I love them.
Or not even that - just come to an understand that kids with disabilities are human beings first and foremost. Could we just start with that?
Like I said, an odd day. Way too much thinking. I hope my day has inspired you to do some thinking of you own.
It started this afternoon when I read this post about the restraint and seclusion of special needs kids in classrooms. Please take time to read this post - it is heart-breaking and unfortunately TRUE.
From there I jumped over to one of my other "pet" research projects - the Judge Rotenberg Center, which is a school for persons with disabilities that achieves targeted behavior through the use of an electric shock device. Yes, you read that correctly. The kind of device people use to train their pets... except it's used on defenseless disabled kids. The kind of electric shock delivered to children at the JRC is more than 80 times stronger than a conventional stun gun that would be used by a police force.
This "school" is so reviled that the United Nations is interested in its methods - because they believe it violates UN statutes on torture. If your school is under UN suspicion for torture, why the hell are you still open?
The JRC website that I quoted above features a lot of videos and pictures from parents and former students talking about how the GED (shock) device has changed their lives. How much were these people paid? How can so many people be absolutely blind to the degradation and abuse that occurs at JRC?
JRC also uses "mechanical restraint" - which means that students are tied to chairs or "restraint boards" and left that way, often for hours or days. JRC also has a food withholding program.
Once again, I'll just say - WHY THE HELL ARE THEY STILL OPEN?!
Here is a report on a young woman who DIED at JRC. She was 19 years old, mentally handicapped, and non-verbal. A few days before she died, she began acting sick. Because of the "system" used at JRC, staff members thought she was exhibiting "noncompliant" behaviors, so she was punished with the use of "aversives," including being pinched or smacked, having to smell ammonia, or eating jalapeno peppers. On the day that she died, more than 60 "adversives" were administered to this young woman. She was clearly ill, but calling a nurse was delayed because it was thought she was still being "noncompliant" ... and when a nurse was called in, they delayed calling an ambulance. Once at the hospital surgery was delayed, and she died.
This young woman's postmortem report showed that she had a perforated stomach and numerous gastric ulcers. Further investigation revealed that she had been on a food-reduction program that was based on correct answers to "school" work on a computer - but this young woman had no realization of the concept that correct answers = food. If she got her answers wrong, she didn't eat.
Reading this report just made me sick.
And then, after viewing a few videos on the JRC controversy, I stumbled upon another controversy - that of Amanda Baggs. I had unknowingly posted about her before. She is the "author" of a YouTube video called "In My Language." A few years ago I had to watch this video for my Disability and Society video, and at that time I thought it was amazing.
It is - but not for the reason I thought. It's amazing because Amanda Baggs is a fake.
Here is evidence proving that Amanda Baggs has never had low-functioning autism, which is what she claims in the YouTube video. She was a gifted student throughout school. She went to college at Simon's Rock at age 14. It was at Simon's Rock that she began use of LSD and other psychotropic hallucinogens. She was diagnosed with schizophrenia, diagnosed herself with DID or DPD (also known as Multiple Personality Disorder), then took that all back, and now claims that she is a low-functioning non-verbal autistic. She has also been diagnosed with Factitious Disorder / Munchausen Syndrome, which if you ask me explains a lot. Please read the first link posted in this paragraph - it explains more than I can get into here.
Autism of the sort that she is claiming to have does NOT just appear around age 14. You don't live a life as a speaking, toilet-trained, gifted child for 14 years and then just suddenly REGRESS unless there is sufficient trauma, like a closed head injury or a stroke. There's just no way. That's just not autism.
And please don't think I have no idea about these things - I have been working with children with disabilities since I was in the seventh grade (I am now 23 and a senior in college). I have worked with children who are affected with autism. Their parents would kill for them to be able to speak/write/type with the clarity that Amanda Baggs claims to possess. They would also kill for their kids to be able to be toilet-trained, or to look them in the eye, or to stop biting themselves.
I have always held persons with Munchausen syndrome / Munchausen by proxy disorder to be cruel and disgusting people. Parents or caregivers with MBP have injected their charges with feces, contaminated waste, or worse. And people who fake an illness to get attention - I'd like to introduce you to families whose lives are hell because their children have a legitimate illness or disability and they can't get the support, respite, medical supplies, insurance, or medical care that they need.
What makes it worse in Amanda Baggs' case is that she has become a sort of "godsend" to families who have children with autism. She appears to be competent with her typing device, and to be fully cognizant, and to laud herself as some sort of "autism activist," and that has led to false hope. I am not one to squash hope for these families, because I know well enough how damn little they have - but this sort of thing just isn't true.
She is being held up as a savior to this community of people who are desperate for answers about autism. I think it is sick that she holds herself up in this way when there is plenty of proof that she IS "normal." She does need understanding and help, but not from the world at large - from psychiatric professionals, more like.
I would like Amanda to have to look my kids and their families in the eye. I have worked with and lived with these kids, day in and day out. I have celebrated their successes and mourned at their troubles. I have danced with a girl who wears protective clothing to keep herself from bashing her face into her knee or from biting herself, among others. I have made it my mission to speak for the voiceless - not fakers.
It pisses me off that people can claim we're so "advanced" when our attitude towards people with disabilities includes faking things to get attention, and electric shocks. As many people quoted about the JRC have said, if these techniques were being used on prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, the whole world would be in an uproar. But because we're using them on kids with disabilities, kids can DIE and nobody notices.
Want to do something useful for the autism community? Or the disability community as a whole?
Look into these kids' eyes. Realize they're people too - realize that all people with disabilities deserve rights, safety, and love. They deserve better than what we've given them so far. Work for their love, success, and welfare. Give THEM a voice.
Here are some of my kids -
Lydia
Melissa
Madi
Grace
Shawna
Wendy
I love these kids more than life itself - it bothers me to think that the world is so damn backwards that they're continually going to be screwed over. I just wish everybody could see them the way I see them, love them the way I love them.
Or not even that - just come to an understand that kids with disabilities are human beings first and foremost. Could we just start with that?
Like I said, an odd day. Way too much thinking. I hope my day has inspired you to do some thinking of you own.